


you were the choice I made before I knew what the other choices were

by echoes_of_realities



Series: time passes, in love and in seasons [1]
Category: Glee
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, Fluff, I'm so late but I can't help it, Summer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 06:05:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13711449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/echoes_of_realities/pseuds/echoes_of_realities
Summary: Summer comes and goes in the quiet moments. It comes and goes in the quiet moments of time passing away from the critical eyes of high school, where they can just be the them that they always are when it’s just Brittany-and-Santana. It comes and goes like a flower unfurling its petals towards the sun in the new beginning of a different sunrise every morning.It’s at the start of the summer that Brittany offers Santana her hand without fear.It’s at the end of the summer that Santana offers Brittany her hand without fear.





	you were the choice I made before I knew what the other choices were

**Author's Note:**

> I’m like at least three years late to this lmao. Though I did actually watch Glee way back when it first came out but I never really got into it and stopped watching after the first season. I really should have hung on to get to the Brittana lol whoops. So I was both there at the very beginning and far too late lol, but oh well. It’s also femslash February too and I don't really care that I'm late so, you know, there’s my excuse. I’m just really interested in Brittana fluff and the summer between Junior and Senior year. And also that Brittana part in "Paradise by the Dashboard Light." Also I wrote two midterms today before I edited this so I almost definitely missed some mistakes.
> 
> Title and excerpts from “Apology” by Shane Koyczan.

 

_“We’ve managed to muddle through the awkward stage of ‘I like you’ and ‘do you like me?’; but when we both said 'Yes'?_

_Life became a multiple choice test_

_Not knowing anything we became each other’s best guess_

_And holding your hand is less like exploration and more like discovery_

_Lady, I don’t have to study you to be sure_

_You were the choice I made before I knew what the other choices were.”_

 

* * *

 

Summer is the sunshine dusted over cheeks in shades of pink and a golden spattering of freckles, and it’s the feeling of fingers sticky with ice cream and the scent evening sun that clings to clothes and hair like midnight. It’s the catch of a sunbeam shining through a blonde braid, and it’s stars caught in the vast darkness of eyes that can see straight through a soul. It’s kisses that taste like chlorine and strawberries and carefree youth, and it’s fingertips that dance across skin as gentle as butterfly wings and trace the pound of a heartbeat through muscle and bone until fingerprints are left against the fragile centre of love.

Summer is the time when they don’t have to see anyone from school, and they don’t have to be anyone but them because no judging eyes can see through Santana’s bedroom door or past the tall fence around Brittany’s backyard. Summer is the time when they can just be them. Summer is the time for a new beginning to unfurl inside their chests like a flower searching for the sunlight in the other’s heartbeat.

It’s at the start of the summer that Brittany offers Santana her hand without fear.

 

* * *

 

When Santana feels Brittany’s fingers brush hers under the blanket she almost has a goddamn heart attack. Lithe fingers trace softly against the outside edge of her hand, bypassing her pinky to run fingerprints across the back of it.

“Britt,” Santana hisses, eyes urgently darting around the plane, never settling on one person for too long before glancing to the next.

Brittany doesn’t say anything, instead she twists her wrist, turning her hand palm up, thumb brushing across the length of Santana’s hand. She just waits there patiently, eyes steady and clear and sure, hand hovering against the side of Santana’s thigh and thumb comfortably pressed to Santana’s hand.

Santana swallows her protests and tries to ignore the fear bubbling in her stomach and choking her. She gives Brittany a pleading, desperate look. It’s not that she doesn’t want to hold Brittany’s hand, it’s just, well—

“Britt?” she croaks.

Brittany just keeps waiting, smiling gently at Santana as if she knows something that Santana doesn’t, patient and confident in her best friend. Santana’s eyes dart around the plane again and her heart pounds loudly until it almost feels like it might just escape, but the sheer force of absolute _yearning_ pounding through her to hold Brittany’s hands is dwarfed by the terror clinging and sticking persistently to the inside of her stomach.

“Britt,” Santana whispers helplessly, and then her eyes meet bright, sure, blue and Santana deflates. She sighs and, with trembling fingers, she slowly twists her hand to press her palm to Brittany’s, fingers twining comfortably as if their palms were sculpted from each other. Brittany’s eyes never leave hers, patient and proud, as she briefly tightens her fingers against Santana’s, smile soft and awed.

Santana gulps a breath and smiles back weakly as they turn back to the movie they had been watching before Brittany’s twitching fingers sent her into a spiral. Santana remains tense against Brittany’s side, her fingers flexing as if trying to escape every time a flight attendant or passenger stumbles sleepily down the aisle, before they still against Brittany’s again. After long, tense moments, and a scene and a half passes, Brittany turns her head towards Santana and leans closer to her.

“You okay?” she mumbles lowly, the scent of coffee and mint gum flooding Santana’s nose as it flutters against her face. Santana releases a shaky breath she hadn’t realized she was holding; Brittany always did know what she needed before she ever realized she it was. 

Santana adjusts the blanket covering their lap, tenting it better over where their hands rest between their seats but not releasing Brittany’s warm hand from her grasp. “Yeah,” Santana mumbles back, equally lowly, her voice cracking over the single syllable and splitting it into two trembling sounds. Brittany briefly squeezes her fingers where they’re slotted against Santana’s and smiles at her and Santana’s entire being calms, the fear settling back down to the low boil she’s used to. “Yeah,” she repeats, smiling back at Brittany, “I’m good.”

Brittany beams at her and turns back to the movie playing on the seat front of them. Santana only half pays attention to it, more focused on the way Brittany’s hand feels in hers outside of one of their bedrooms, and how their shared pair of earphones means that they have to lean their heads closer together—Santana’s cheek pressed to Brittany’s shoulder—so they don’t pull the buds out of their ears, and how nobody gives the two girls sharing more space than perhaps strictly necessary a second glance, and how when Brittany breathes out Santana breathes in their shoulders brush and their forearms press closer underneath the blanket, and how Santana’s head is buzzing with _BrittanyBrittanyBrittany—_

Brittany sighs against her and, after a quick glance around the dimly lit the plane, presses a soft kiss to Santana’s temple. Santana’s face erupts in flame and she groans lowly, burying her face deeper into Brittany’s shoulder and wondering when such simple acts of affection from Brittany will stop sending her heart into palpitations. Brittany giggles into her hair and Santana wills her face to stop flushing so deeply, and wills her stomach from bubbling up in fear again. Brittany glances around once more and then presses another soft kiss to her hair, twisting their fingers together under the blanket and breathing in the herbal scent of the hotel shampoo clinging to Santana’s hair, so different from the sharp scent of the shampoo Santana’s been using since the sixth grade, like citrus and vanilla and pinewood and that one flower that sounds like _penny_. 

Santana shudders against her, and for a split second Brittany wonders if she scared Santana again and sent her into one of her panics, but then she feels more than sees Santana take a deep breath and nuzzle further into Brittany’s shoulder, pressing a smile there and sleepily humming like she does when she’s about to take an afternoon nap after a lazy morning of doing homework with Brittany on one of their usual weekend sleepovers. Brittany grins, because they took off at eight in the morning and have only been in the air for about half an hour, and Santana’s never been much of a morning person.

“Tired?” Brittany whispers.

“Mmm,” Santana hums.

Brittany giggles and cranes her neck to see over the seat in front of her. Mercedes and Sam and Quinn are sitting two rows ahead of them—Mr. Schue had only managed to book tickets for the same flight if the glee club kids were spread out over the plane, and so most of them are on the right side of the plane, clustered together at the front, while five students had to sit near the back on the left side. Santana and Brittany had immediately and simultaneously claimed the lone two seats, volunteering to sit with a stranger in exchange for the relative privacy from the rest of the club the seats offered.

Quinn is sleeping, presumably, her head leaned against the window and her body still, her freshly cut hair brushing the peak of her right shoulder as her head gently rocks with the movement of the plane. Mercedes and Sam are talking quietly, careful not to disturb Quinn, heads bent towards each other and occasionally hushing soft laughter. Brittany glances over to the other side of the plane where the rest of the glee club members are sitting in stony and uncomfortable silence; the closest member, Kurt, is sitting stiffly in the aisle seat six rows in front of her and Santana, far enough away that Brittany can barely see him, so she presses one more kiss to Santana’s hair before settling back down. The man beside her snores and snuffs in his sleep before resettling. 

A peel of Mercedes’ laughter causes Brittany to crane her neck up again to catch sight of her, partially dislodging Santana from her side, who grumbles more about lacking Brittany’s shoulder as a pillow than being awoken as she was drifting to sleep. Sam is already hushing Mercedes and casting a wary but still amused glance at Quinn, who hadn’t moved a muscle.

The toddler in in the seat directly in front of Brittany, right between Brittany and Mercedes, catches sight of her over his mother’s shoulder, and shrieks with bright, guileless laughter as Brittany starts pulling faces at him through the small crack between the seats. She feels Santana’s breathe catch and glances down at her, but her face is unreadable. Brittany worries for a second, but Santana looks up at her with sleepy, wide eyes and, though there’s a hint of fear there, she doesn’t move away from Brittany, and she doesn’t untangle their hands. Brittany studies her face and tries to figure out what Santana’s thinking, which is usually, like, Brittany’s ultimate superpower but it seems to be failing her right now. She’s not unreadable and stony and pained in the way she had been for the last couple months, instead she’s unreadable in some strange, faraway, almost hopeful way. 

All at once, with the soft humming of chatter around them and the occasional snores of the man beside her and the childish giggles of the toddler in front of them, Brittany realizes what Santana’s thinking, and Brittany’s face softens as a smile spreads, hopeful and bright and so full of adoration for Santana that she feels like her face can barely contain it, thinking about that same strange, faraway, almost hopeful place where Santana’s thoughts are blooming.

Santana ducks her head for a moment, fear clouding her face for a split second, before smiling just as brightly and hopefully up at Brittany, under eyelashes that fail to hide the adoration sparkling in dark eyes. Santana settles back against Brittany’s shoulder and tightens her fingers around Brittany’s hand, and Brittany ignores the movie to breathe in Santana, more focused on the steady pulse she feels in Santana’s wrist, and how Santana’s cheek feels against her shoulder, and how nobody gives the two girls sharing more space than perhaps strictly necessary a second glance, and how Santana’s warmth is seeping into her through her shoulder and arm and palm and fingertips, and how she can feel Santana’s breath fan across her collarbone every time she breathes out and Brittany breathes in, and how Brittany’s head is buzzing with hope and faraway places and _SantanaSantanaSantana—_

 

* * *

 

June is a rush of weekend sleepovers and stressing about exams and easy glee club practices without the pressure of Nationals hanging over them; it’s spent avoiding teachers as they scurry around corners and into shadowy alcoves, linked pinkies more often than not turning into slipping handholds as they drag the other into a dark classroom and stifle giggles against hands and shoulders and necks as teachers walk past, mumbling about former cheerleaders thinking they can be at the school after-hours just because they’re waiting around for glee club to start.

 

* * *

 

When the sound of the doorbell draws Santana out of a deep sleep she grumbles and rolls over, pulling the covers over her head and hopping whoever’s at the door before nine on the first lazy Sunday morning of summer break will just go away.

The doorbell continues ringing and Santana groans, throwing her covers off and rolling over to her back to glare up at the ceiling. Eventually she can’t block the ringing out and she grumbles as she rolls out of bed, cursing when her feet touch the cool hardwood of the hallways as she forces herself to the front door. “This better be good,” she mutters as she nears the entryway, throwing it open with a huff and half a mind to start yelling at whoever has decided to wake her up before nine am on the weekend in summer.

The first thing that happens when she unlocks and pulls the door open is something small and excited launching itself against her lower half, thin arms thrown around her and a face buried in her stomach, dark hair already falling out of twin braids and sneakers nudging against Santana’s bare toes.

“Squirt?” she asks, confusion and sleep battling and making it really hard to comprehend anything that’s happening as she automatically wraps her arms around the tiny body pressing against her.

“‘Tana!” the head of hair squeals into her stomach and tightens her arms around Santana’s torso. Santana tries to blink away her haze and glances out the doorway for a explanation of why the youngest Pierce is ringing her doorbell this early in the morning. Her explanation is leaning lazily against the door. It’s Brittany, because of course it’s Brittany, and Santana’s breath catches somewhere between her chest and her nose, blooming in her throat and filling her heart up until it feels too big for her body to contain and the only thing she can do is let out a quiet gasp, letting the too full feeling escape her in a slow exhale. She looks summer beautiful, all golden blonde hair and sky blue eyes and June sun freckles and ripped jean cutoffs and tattered old sneakers. She looks like summer personified, sun-warm and carefree, as if all the best memories of summer break had merged together into one person.

Her beauty makes Santana’s chest ache, and she’s suddenly too aware of her messy and tangled bedhead and the sleep she can feel caught in the corners of her eyes and that she’s only wearing an old pair of sleep shorts patterned with penguins and an old cheer-shirt with _PIERCE_ emblazoned across the shoulders that Brittany had left, thrown and forgotten in the corner of her room, months ago before everything got weird and painful. She’s never been this self-conscious of how she looks in Brittany’s presence because they’ve had hundreds upon hundreds of sleepovers since kindergarten and Brittany’s definitely seen her in worse states of clothing and less, but there’s something about the glow of the sun behind Brittany that makes Santana feel like she’s standing before something more than human. Santana swallows thickly when Brittany’s face softens, that soft smile spreading across her face, the one that pulls her lips up and out and squishes her cheeks up against her eyes and makes her gaze dart down to her shoes for a brief moment.

“Hi,” Santana says, her voice coming out breathless and awed, fighting a blush she knows is already feel rising to her cheeks.

“Hi,” Brittany murmurs back, her eyes bright and comforting and adoring as her gaze trails over Santana’s figure. Santana tightens her fingers against Brittany’s sister and looks down, fighting both a smile and a blush and knowing she fails miserably as she feels Brittany’s warm gaze remain steady on her.

“What are you two doing here?” she finally manages to ask and the munchkin peels her face off of Santana’s stomach to tip her head back and grin up at Santana, her smile so achingly familiar that Santana just has to take a glance at the real thing to make sure it’s still there. It is, and it widens when it catches Santana’s wandering gaze. Santana snaps her eyes back down to the munchkin and playfully pokes at the girl’s nose.

“‘Tana!” she shrieks, batting her hand away and giggling. “We’re here to invite you on a picnic!”

“Really?” Santana asks, grinning at the girl. She giggles and nods excitedly, bouncing up and down on her toes. Santana glances at Brittany’s soft smile and only then notices the large basket by Brittany’s feet, the top covered with an old patchwork jean blanket, a pattern of sunflowers and crows stitched the edges, the one that Brittany’s mom had gotten as a baby-shower gift from a coworker the year Brittany was born. “A picnic huh?” Santana teases, looking back at the munchkin with a smirk. The munchkin nods furiously, excited and guileless, her braids slapping against her shoulders.

“That is, if you’re not busy or anything,” Brittany pipes up, a small frown marring her pretty features. “Oh my God, I totally forgot that you might be busy. It’s fine if you are! The munchkin and I can just do it by ourselves but she really wanted you to come and I haven’t seen you since school ended and I know we’ve been texting all the time but I missed seeing you everyday and I should have asked you if you were free first and—”

“Britt,” Santana interrupts with a soft smile, adoration ballooning in her chest again at the blonde’s rambling until it feels like she might just burst with how much love she has for the girl in front of her. That, and the fact that Brittany is also so unsure and nervous about where this thing between them is going makes Santana feel about a billion times better about her own anxiety. “It’s okay,” she assures, and she wonders if Brittany can feel her love from where she stands three feet away. Pink spreads high on Brittany’s cheeks and across the tip of her nose as she relaxes. “I’d love to go on a picnic,” Santana continues with a glance between her two favourite people in the whole world, “But since it’s short notice you’re going to have to wait around for me to shower and have breakfast first.”

The munchkin’s grin and cheer at this news are rivalled only by the bright smile slowly spreading across Brittany’s face again. “I brought you a coffee. And that breakfast sandwich you like so much from the Lima Bean. They’re just in the basket,” she says, nudging the basket with her sneakered toe.

Santana sighs and blames the fact that she’s still a little sleepy when her only response is, “You really are the perfect girl.”

Both of their blushes deepen, eyes too bright and too wide on each other, until the munchkin starts tugging on Santana’s hand. “Can I watch cartoons until you’re done getting ready ‘Tana?”

“Uh, yeah, of course,” she says, still a little dazed by what just came out of her mouth and the fact that Brittany is looking at her like she just got all of her Christmas and birthday presents at once. The munchkin kicks off her sneakers and scampers off towards the living room, searching around the couches and coffee table for the remotes and making herself at home as if she’s lived in the living room her whole life.

Brittany steps into the house, leaning down to move the picnic basket inside the door before shutting it with her hip. When she stands up she’s suddenly a lot closer than before, with Santana still frozen to the spot just on the end of the old mat inside the entrance to the house. 

Brittany breathes in sharply as the scent of Santana invades her senses, still bed-warm and sleepy, and she smiles shyly. “Hi,” she whispers.

Santana smiles, a little awed and a little shy as well, tipping her chin up slightly to take in the freckles across Brittany’s nose and cheeks like a sprinkling of wet sand and the slight sunburn already pinking the peak of her cheekbones where the skin squishes up agains her eyes whenever she smiles. “Hi,” she whispers back.

“You look adorable,” Brittany mumbles, glancing at Santana from beneath her eyelashes, timid and earnest and more than a little bashful.

Santana’s body shivers involuntarily and she smiles up at Brittany. She wants to maintain her tough façade and tell Brittany that she’s not adorable, but the flush darkening Brittany’s cheeks and the adoration sparking in bright blue eyes makes it hard for Santana to do anything other than melt into a contented puddle on the floor like a kitten rolling over into a sunbeam. “Yeah?” she murmurs, eyes caught on Brittany’s.

Brittany nods earnestly, reaching over to pluck at her own surname emblazoned across the back of Santana’s shirt, something warm and bright and longing rippling across her face. “Totally,” she assures, stepping even closer and further into Santana’s space, the fingers that were plucking at Santana’s shirt sliding up and over the back of her neck and into thick hair as her other hand rests softly against Santana’s bicep.

“Well you’re pretty adorable yourself, Pierce,” Santana teases softly, and everything suddenly makes so much sense that she can’t help herself when she curls her fingers into the belt loops of Brittany’s jean shorts and tugs her until they’re flush against each other, rising up briefly on her tiptoes to press her lips chastely to Brittany’s, swallowing her coffee-scented breath and the taste of her vanilla lip-chap and a hum of contentment as Brittany’s lips automatically part under hers.

Santana draws back after a moment, the lengths of their bodies still pressed flush against each other, lips tingling with Brittany’s vanilla chapstick, and as suddenly as everything made perfect sense fear bubbles up again in Santana’s chest. “Was that okay?” she asks, the gut-churning terror that she just messed everything up, _again_ , making her words come out all squished and high and flighty.

Brittany smiles easily and scratches her fingers soothingly against Santana’s scalp as her hand slides further up into dark hair, her other hand rubbing up and down Santana’s bare arm. She presses another quick, chaste kiss to Santana’s lips, smiling into the kiss when she feels Santana relax and hum under her. She draws back and can’t help but to press her lips to Santana’s again. “It was perfect,” she whispers and savours the pleasant twist in her stomach as Santana smiles shyly up at her, until the face she adores so spreads into dimples and teeth and crinkled eyes and she’s beaming up at Brittany.

“Good,” Santana whispers back, rising up on her tiptoes and pressing one, two, three kisses to warm lips in quick succession before pulling back and extracting herself from Brittany’s arms with a small smile. “I really do have to go and shower,” she says reluctantly, only to be interrupted by the growling of her stomach, “and eat,” she adds sheepishly. 

Brittany giggles and steps towards Santana again, wrapping her fingers around a slim wrist and tugging once to pull Santana back to her for one more kiss, both smiling against the other’s mouth before Brittany finally releases Santana and steps away. “Okay, you can go now.” 

Santana giggles and turns towards the stairs, lingering slightly at the bottom so she can send Brittany one last blushing smile before scampering up the stairs two at a time, feeling much more comfortable about where exactly she stands with Brittany than she had, tossing and turning, the night before.

An hour later, after a shower and some food and one last episode of cartoons, the three of them make their way down the street to the green area and park a couple blocks from Santana’s house. The park is pretty quiet, only a couple of kids shrieking at each other on the playground and a couple families spread out across the grass in the sun. They settle under a large oak closer to the row of fenced yards bordering the south side of the park than to the playground. It’s the same oak where Santana and blushingly pushed herself up on her tiptoes and pressed her lips to Brittany’s for the very first time, twelve years-old and filled with kid-stupid bravery and a dare from Brittany herself, back before everything was complicated and they were just _Santana-and-Brittany_ , back before Santana got terrified of everything she was feeling and Brittany got terrified of scaring Santana away. Santana glances over at Brittany as they spread the blanket on the ground, still able to remember the wonderment on Brittany’s face and the way her cheeks pinked after Santana pulled back.

Brittany wears that same look now, cheeks pink and eyes bright and smile soft, and Santana knows they’re remembering the same thing. And then the munchkin is tugging on both of their hands, dragging them, giggling and excited, to the playground. Santana and Brittany just smile helplessly at each other over the munchkin’s head and let themselves be pulled off under the bright summer sun.

Hours later they’re back on the blanket, munching on snacks and giggling at the munchkin’s stories of schoolmates and dreams and far-off places. As Brittany pulls out a bag of cherries for them to share the munchkin perks up and stops mid-story.

“Do the thing! Do the thing! Do the thing!” she cries, jumping up and down on her knees like she can’t contain her excitement.

Santana reaches over and ruffles her dark hair with a grin. “What thing, squirt?”

The munchkin scowls and swats at the hand on her head and looks so much like a younger Santana for a moment that the two older girls look at each other and burst out laughing. The munchkin’s scowl deepens and Brittany tries to control her laughter, reaching forward for a cherry and popping it, steam and all, into her mouth before leaning back on her hands, her legs stretched out on the blanket and partially tangled with Santana’s and partially tangled with the munchkin’s. Everyone had lost their shoes before running through the playground’s sand and their feet were all filthy from chasing each other around the park. “Chill, lil’ sis,” she says carefully around the cherry, nudging the munchkin’s thigh with her toes, “I’m doing it.”

Santana tilts her head at Brittany, who spits the cherry pit into the grass a couple feet from the blanket, and the munchkin’s scowl is replaced with a smile as bright as Brittany’s as she claps her hands together. Brittany smirks at Santana and winks, and Santana’s stomach bottoms out as she starts to realize what exactly Brittany’s doing. 

Brittany’s mouth works for a while, twisting back and forth, and Santana tries to ignore the twist in her own stomach at the look on Brittany’s face as she gazes at her, something amused and just on this side of indecent dancing in her bright blue eyes. The munchkin just keeps bouncing and clapping like an overexcitable golden retriever which, considering she’s a Pierce, isn’t actually all that far off. Finally Brittany grins and sticks her tongue out, the cherry steam resting on the tip of her tongue, still stained blue from the blue-raspberry candy they shared earlier, a perfect knot tied in the middle of the steam.

The munchkin giggles with delight and cheers and Santana’s mouth goes completely dry while Brittany continues to smirk at her.

“Wasn’t that _amazing_ ‘Tana?” the munchkin squeals, tugging on Santana’s arm. Santana makes a noise of agreement and tries to focus on not swallowing her tongue or jumping Brittany’s bones in broad daylight at the park as she remembers exactly how talented that tongue is and how those pink lips felt pressed against her own just that morning.

“‘Tana?”

“Huh?”

“Are you feeling okay? Your face is all bright and warm-looking and stuff.”

Santana blinks and draws her eyes from where Brittany’s mouth had stretched into a knowing smirk to glance at the munchkin. “Yeah I’m fine,” she assures, ignoring how raspy her voice has gone, “It’s just really warm out.” One glance at Brittany tells her that her hoarse voice is doing the same thing to the blonde that Brittany’s cherry-stem knot is doing to her. She allows herself a small, smug smile and this time she’s the one who sends Brittany a knowing smirk. Brittany just grins at being caught, winking and sticking her tongue out, the cherry-stem still stark against he blue-tinted pink of her tongue. Santana groans and leans back against the oak tree, but her grin doesn’t leave her face as Brittany starts giggling.

It’s barely a few minutes after the munchkin’s exciting bouncing when she crashes, suddenly and without warning, like always, and slumps against the tree beside Santana before curling into her side. She throws a careless arm around Santana’s middle when the older girl raises her arm to wrap around the tiny shoulders pressed against her.

“I missed you, ‘Tana,” she mumbles sleepily, her head lolling against Santana’s shoulder and her legs coming up so she can curl against Santana better. 

Santana swallows thickly and glances up to see Brittany already staring at her, steady and soft. “I missed you too,” Brittany whispers. 

Santana closes her eyes briefly, partially savouring the moment and partially trying to stop the tears stinging her eyes. “I missed you guys too,” she admits in a rasp.

Her only answer is a tiny snore from the munchkin, muffled slightly by Santana’s shoulder where her face is buried. Santana glances up at Brittany and everything in her eases as they giggle at each other. Santana blushes and smiles down at her lap when Brittany lifts her phone and snaps quick pictures of Santana and her sister, ignoring Santana’s giggling protests as Brittany takes pictures in increasingly dramatic positions, muttering directions to Santana like an obnoxious paparazzi. 

Santana pretends she’s not blushing furiously when Brittany makes the best one her lockscreen. It’s one where the munchkin is curling further into Santana’s side, face pressed to a cloth covered shoulder and drooling slightly into it, fingers curled in Santana’s shirt and bunching the fabric across her stomach, Santana’s face turned towards the small, dark head of hair against her, smile soft and a secure arm protectively wrapped around tiny shoulders.

She also pretends she’s not blushing furiously when, after a quick glance around the nearly deserted park, Brittany leans over and presses a gentle kiss to the munchkin’s forehead, grinning fondly when her sister mumbles sleepily and curls further into Santana’s warmth, and then leans up to press a lingering kiss to Santana’s forehead, drawing back slowly and flushing prettily when she catches Santana’s wide-eyed look of wonder and longing. After one more glance around the park, Brittany leans back in and presses her mouth gently against chapped lips, soft and timid, only pulling back when more sleepy mumbles reach their ears, both blushing and smiling at each other in the long, evening shadows of the old oak tree where they had first blushingly pressed their lips against each other.

 

* * *

 

June comes and goes in the quiet moments, with shy smiles exchanged over sidewalks and kitchen tables and popcorn bowls, with not-a-date-coffee-dates at the Lima Bean with feet tangled together under the table and blushes frozen permanently to cheeks, with hands slipping innocently under tank tops and t-shirts during chaste kisses that always slow before becoming something more, with arms brushing in the bright afternoon sun and fingers tangled in the light of the moon and soft smiles as they watch a different sunset each weekend from childhood wooden swings in backyards.

 

* * *

 

“Your marshmallows are so gross.”

“Gross? Really, squirt? Just because you like yours burnt to a crisp instead of perfect, golden, gooey goodness doesn’t make _my_ marshmallows gross.”

“Well it just does. Who wants uncooked marshmallows anyway?”

Brittany laughs and nudges her sister in the side with the toe of her sneakers, sprawled sideways across the camping chair so her head lolls toward’s Santana, their armrests overlapping each other’s. “Well _I_ like San’s marshmallows the best.”

“Well you’re gross too,” the munchkin declares, and then marches around to the other side of the fire to their dad. He sends a wink at them over the flickering flames and grins when the munchkin demands to be cuddled because the older girls are weird and gross and have a vendetta against her marshmallows.

Brittany just rolls her eyes and gives Santana a smirk that slides into an adoring smile when Santana offers her a s’more with a perfectly golden, gooey marshmallow. “Thanks,” she murmurs and Santana’s smile turns inward and bashful as Brittany takes the s’more from her.

“You’re welcome, Britt,” she murmurs, settling back into her camping chair and snuggling further into the hoodie Brittany had gently tugging over her head before they headed out to start the fire, her bicep making a rest for Brittany’s head. The sun had long set and the munchkin should have been in bed hours ago, but the sunlight had been lazily warm all day and Pierce Pierce had treated the family to a steak barbecue just because and Whitney Pierce had made baked potatoes and marinated veggies for the grill and boiled corn on the cob and Brittany and Santana had volunteered to build a fire just as the sun was starting to creep back behind the horizon, to the equal excitement of the munchkin and Pierce.

Brittany pulls apart her s’more and splits her time between dropping gooey chocolatey pieces of crackers into her mouth and feeding them to Santana. Brittany has to reach her arm up and over her head to feed Santana, forcing Santana to lean over and let her face hover above Brittany’s in order to wrap her lips around the offered s’more, occasionally nipping at fingertips whenever she notices Whitney and Pierce are caught up in their conversation and ignoring a pouting munchkin. Eating the s’more sends them into fits of giggles as strings of marshmallows draw out like spider silk and stick to chins as Brittany pulls the s’more apart, wiping the other’s mouth with fingers they wished were really lips. Neither of them notice Whitney’s small, knowing smile across the fire as she watches the two girls who have been inseparable since that first week of kindergarten.

“I knew this was the place to be. Mind if we join.”

Everyone at the fire glances up at the two newcomers, neighbours of the Pierce’s that moved in about six years ago and who have grown kids and kind smiles. Pierce waves at them as the munchkin buries herself further into his embrace, still pouting at Santana and Brittany across the fire, while Whitney greets the neighbours before turning to the two girls eating the last of their s’more, far more subdued than they were mere moments ago when it was just them and Brittany’s warm family.

“Brittany, go and take Santana and get some more chairs from the garage.”

“It’s okay, mom,” Brittany says as she swings her self around so she’s sitting in the chair properly, rubbing her sticky fingers against her jeans before standing, “they can have our chairs. I wanna look all the different kinds of stars in the sky anyways.”

“Don’t they all look the same?” their neighbour asks, trying to politely correct her, but before Brittany can feels the itch of being once again misunderstand flush her cheeks Santana stands and steps beside her, hands buried deep in the front pocket of Brittany’s slightly too-baggy hoodie. 

Her face remains pleasant and her voice drips with false sweetness as she smiles up at the neighbour. “No, they’re not all the same. They all have a different story.”

And then she threads her arm through Brittany’s, elbows locking together, and leads her away from the fire, far enough that the conversation turns to a quiet murmur and they’re hidden from the circle of light the flickering flames cast around the backyard, before flopping down on the dew-cool ground and patting the space beside her.

“Thanks, Santana,” Brittany murmurs, gazing down at the lazily stretched out body of her best friend and feeling a blooming sense of happiness when she thinks of how lucky she is that they met.

“Anytime, Britt,” Santana says easily. “Just because those assholes don’t get it doesn’t mean you should be embarrassed. It’s their own fault they’re not as smart as you are.”

Brittany’s face flushes and opens like a flower curling towards the sun and she feels a pleasant tugging in her stomach as she lays down beside Santana, leaving precious few inches between them as Santana smiles at her, proud and shining.

They lay there in comfortably silence, only broken by the occasional bout of laughter from the fire or Brittany pointing out a cluster of stars and explaining the story of their constellation or Santana’s curious questions as she regards Brittany with eyes as bright and open as the stars above them.

Santana breaks the comfortable silence after long moments of staring up at the stars.

“You broke my heart,” she admits to the stars.

“I know,” Brittany murmurs. Santana sighs softly and turns her head to look at Brittany, her pale face shrouded in inky shadows on one side and lit up in the faintest of gold by the flickering firelight on the other, the freckles along her temple caught in dancing shadows. They smile softly at each other, their cheeks cooling where they press in the damp grass so they can study the other, mentally tracing the outline of features they already know better than their own. “You broke my heart too.”

“I know,” Santana says. Brittany hums in agreement and they spend long moments caught in each others eyes, listening to the crackle of the fire as it spits and twists around wood and the buzz of mosquitoes, the murmuring of conversation and laughter on the other side of the yard and the dog barking in the distance, the sounds of a party down the street and the gentle rasp of the other’s breathing. Santana shuffles closer and Brittany mirrors her until there are mere millimetres between their shoulders, close enough that their shoulders brush against the other’s every time they breathe in and out.

Brittany shifts slightly, lifting her hand off her stomach and bringing it down to rest in the short distance between their thighs, palm up and waiting. Santana only hesitates for a moment, dark eyes searching bright blue, before she smiles softly and takes Brittany’s hand, lacing their fingers together in the shadows of their bodies. “We should stop doing that, you know,” Santana murmurs, “breaking each other’s hearts.”

A smile spreads across Brittany’s face, slowly pulling her lips thin before her eyes squish and her eyebrows turn towards each other and her tongue darts to rest between her teeth as a content sigh catches itself against her lips. “Yeah, we really should.”

Santana’s helpless to stop her widening smile in response, dimpling her cheek and scrunching her nose up to crinkle her eyes. “Yeah,” she agrees, and then shifts closer to Brittany until their arms press together all along the length, still fire-warm on the top and grass-cool on the bottom, and their knees knock together as she wraps her ankle around Brittany’s. Santana curves slightly until her head rests against Brittany’s shoulder, her dark hair tickling against Brittany’s cheek and neck. Brittany cranes her neck up to glance at the fire, her mom and dad small shadows across the yard, huddled around a stick with a flaming marshmallow on it, her sister’s jumping around ridiculously as she tries to blow it out, while their neighbours laugh and call encouragement across the circle. 

In the light of the stars and the fire, hidden in the inky darkness just out of the gazes of her family, Brittany snuggles into Santana and drops a series of kisses to the head of nighttime sky hair pressed against her shoulder, trailing her smile along Santana’s head as a sleepy, content sigh reaches her ears and fingers tighten on hers, palms sliding together and elbows bumping as Santana curls closer to Brittany.

Brittany feels the ghost of soft lips over her shoulder before a steady exhale of breath tells her that Santana’s already dozing off.

Brittany smiles against Santana’s hair, before relaxing and turning her gaze back to the inky darkness to count glimmering stars again, her heartbeat steady in the wrist pressed against Santana’s, echoing Santana’s own.

 

* * *

 

July is lazy days spent laying around their houses, complaining about too-difficult-exams and complaining about having to go back to school in only two months and tickling each other until they collapse in a fit of giggles, arms and legs hopelessly tangled on the floors of their bedrooms and on the grass in their yards and under the shade of oak trees when they take the munchkin to the park for a picnic, fingers sticky from dripping ice cream smiles that are warm and teasing and bright.

 

* * *

 

“Again, mom?”

The look Brittany’s mom sends Brittany has her grumbling an apology and agreeing to watch her sister and all her little friends while their mom meets with some friends for coffee and some shopping in the next town over.

Santana looks up from where she’s perched on an island stool, a peanut butter and banana sandwich halfway to her mouth, eyes darting between Brittany and her mom before she swallows her bite of sandwich and sets it down on her plate again. “We don’t mind! Right, Britt-Britt?” Brittany sighs and shakes her head, avoiding her mom’s pointed look. “We didn’t have anything else planned for today anyways.”

Brittany shoots Santana a pointed look and Santana fights the urge to remind Brittany that making out on her bed all day while pretending to watch movies doesn’t technically count as plans; even harder than that, she fights the blush spreading prickling heat under her skin at the thought of making out with Brittany on her bed all day while pretending to watch movies.

“My favourite daughter,” Brittany’s mom teases, beaming and pressing a kiss to the side of Santana’s head as she passes, before reaching for her purse and giving Brittany’s temple a kiss too as she exits the kitchen. Santana just giggles in embarrassment and delight and Brittany can’t help the smile that spreads across her face; she really loves how much her family loves Santana, she loves it kind of a whole lot.

Brittany slinks over to Santana once they hear the garage door open and close, using her body to crowd Santana between the counter and the back of her stool, smirking as Santana’s eyes automatically drop to thin, pink lips. Brittany lets her fingers dance across the bare shoulder in front of her, her torso trapping Santana’s right arm against her stomach and eyes tracing the twist of Santana’s neck as she turns her face up towards Brittany. She walks her fingers across the expanse of tan skin between Santana’s shoulder and neck that she would love to suck bruises to, skipping the strap of the navy blue tank top and instead slipping her fingers under the tied bow of Santana’s black bikini, her smirk widening as Santana’s breath hitches as she scratches blunt fingernails gently over the nape of Santana’s neck.

Brittany pauses and listens for a moment above them before leaning forward and capturing Santana’s lips in the quiet of the mostly empty house. Santana hums in approval as her mouth opens under Brittany’s and her neck twists further towards Brittany, one hand coming up and around her body to cup Brittany’s jaw and hold her in place, tilting their faces towards each other until their noses squish together and their chins bump every time they rock into the kiss, her other arm still trapped awkwardly between their bodies. Santana’s fingers slide along Brittany’s jaw, curling up to settle by her ear and stroke her thumb across a freckled cheekbone, smiling into the kiss when she feels Brittany’s eyelashes flutter against the pad of her thumb. Brittany presses closer to her, her fingers sliding out from under the tied bow of Santana’s bikini strings and up into dark hair, her other hand coming to rest on Santana’s bare thigh, fingers slipping under the hem and stroking the soft skin there as Santana’s smile turns into a groan and she turns her body on the stool towards Brittany. Brittany steps into the open-V of Santana’s legs and tilts Santana’s head further up towards her. Santana’s newly freed hand grips at Brittany’s hip before sliding around to slip into Brittany’s back pocket and she swallows Brittany’s moan as they continue to rock into the kiss.

“Mmm,” Brittany hums as she pulls back just enough to dart her tongue out across her own lips, chest heaving as she struggles for oxygen and mouth almost brushing against Santana’s again, “Peanut buttery.”

Santana gasps and swats at Brittany’s shoulder. “Britt!” she protests, but her giggles and own breathlessness kind of render her disapproval moot, especially when she tilts her head up the scant few millimetres between them and recaptures Brittany’s lips against her own. She languidly licks into Brittany’s mouth and swallows Brittany’s moan as she tastes peanut butter and bananas and milk and, somewhere under all of that, Santana. Santana tilts Brittany’s head further into her with the hand still sliding against her ear, using her other hand, still tucked in the back pocket of jean shorts, to press Brittany even closer. Brittany hums and it buzzes across their lips, tickling so much that Santana breaks away to giggle into Brittany’s neck.

After a long moment to collect herself and her breath she leans back and slides the hand cupping Brittany’s cheek around to brush the moisture from Brittany’s kiss-swollen lips, pinker and brighter than usual. Brittany darts her tongue out to lick at Santana’s fingertips and it’s that, even after heavily making out with and teasing Brittany at the kitchen island, that makes Santana flush and glance down with a shy smile. Brittany’s heart feels like it’s about to burst at Santana’s bashfulness and instead she leans forward again to press a chaste kiss to the fingers she had just been nipping at.

“I love you,” she breathes against the fingertips pressed to her mouth and Santana looks up, eyes brimming with open longing and adoration, wearing that same lovesick, bashful, _who-me?_ expression she’s worn every time Brittany’s told her this over the course of the summer.

Santana breathes in and presses against Brittany with the hand still buried in jean pockets again, drawing Brittany even further into her body as she looks up at Brittany, eyes dark and deep and searching for something she always seems to easily find on Brittany’s face as they crinkle into a smile. “I love you too,” she murmurs quietly, and Brittany’s heart still jumps at that admission, stretching and yearning towards Santana in elation.

Brittany hears the door open upstairs before she hears her sister tearing down the hall and she gives Santana a quick kiss before reluctantly pulling away, putting the kitchen island between them and nodding towards the entryway to the kitchen at Santana’s questioning look. Seconds later, the pound of feet down the stairs reach their ears mere moments before the munchkin slides into view in a red and blue bathing suit, jumping up and down and shouting “They’re here!” before racing towards the front door.

Santana looks over at Brittany and they both grin and laugh at the munchkin’s antics. Santana returns to her sandwich and finishes off the last half, offering Brittany the last bite, one she takes with pleasure because her lips brushing Santana’s fingers as she wraps her lips around the sandwich brings a pretty flustered look to Santana’s face.

The munchkin and four of her friends tear through the kitchen at that moment, paying no mind to the two older girls, and even less mind when Brittany shouts at them to not run in the house or around the pool, rolling her eyes as the screen door slams shut without a response.

She reaches for Santana’s plate and glass, turning towards the sink and ignoring Santana’s protests that she can clean her stuff up as she stands and starts moving towards Brittany. Brittany nods towards the backyard and smiles at Santana. “Go on and keep an eye on the crazies instead. I’ll tidy up in here. It’ll take me like ten minutes.”

“You sure?” Santana asks, hesitating at the end of the island.

Brittany rolls her eyes fondly and smacks Santana’s ass as she passes to grab her sister’s messy leftover plate and cup off the table from her earlier lunch, earning a playful protest and blush. “I’m positive. Go get your tan on.”

Santana still hesitates before glancing over her shoulder towards the porch and seeing the girls already in the pool. She takes three quick steps towards Brittany and leans up to brush her lips shyly over Brittany’s. It still amazes Brittany how, despite heavily making out a mere ten minutes earlier, Santana can still get so bashful and blushing about such a chaste kiss. “Thanks,” she murmurs as she draws back and turns to exit the kitchen, grinning around her blush when she feels the weight of Brittany’s goofy smile on her back.

True to her word, a shadow looms over Santana and blocks out the sun almost exactly ten minutes later. Santana smiles before opening her eyes, already knowing who’s standing over her. When her eyes do blink open her mouth drys at the expanse of pale, freckled skin stretched out before her, eyes dropping from twin braids of golden hair resting on sun-pinked shoulders to trace the line of a lime-green and white bikini covering milky breasts, following the definition of abs that Santana loves to press sucking kisses to, down to the striped bikini bottoms and pausing at the muscled thighs inches from her face, eyes darting up a couple inches to catch on the small triangle of moles Santana knows is hidden just below the fabric in front of her.

And there’s just— There’s just a lot of bare skin, okay? And she already knows exactly how that bare skin tastes and feels under her lips and fingers, okay? And it’s been such a long time since she last got to trace the shape of her love against the pale skin in front of her, okay And she’s only human.

“Santana?”

Santana swallows thickly and looks up to see Brittany’s eyes sparkling brightly, like she knows exactly what she’s doing. “Yeah, Britt?” she rasps.

Brittany holds out a bottle of sunscreen to Santana, her smile entirely too mischievous for their current company of her young sister and friends. “Will you get my back? I don’t trust the munchkin to do it. And, well,” she gestures to the shrieking girls in the pool for the rest of her answer. 

Santana stares at the outstretched bottle before slowly reaching for it and sitting up, reluctantly patting the striped fabric of the lawn chair in front of her for Brittany to sit down, tucking one foot under the crease of her other knee and to make room for Brittany between her legs. It’s not that she cares about putting sunscreen on Brittany’s back, if anything she rather enjoys touching Brittany’s sun-warm skin and counting the freckles there, she rather enjoys it quite a lot, actually. It’s just with the munchkin screaming and giggling with her friends in the pool, Santana feels more than a little awkward, and feels more than a little bit of fear churning under her sternum.

She must have been silent for too long because Brittany turns between her knees, staring at her thoughtfully while she traces small patterns along Santana’s knee where it rests beside her hip. “It’s okay if you don’t want to,” she murmurs, eyes caught on helpless brown, “I can get the munchkin to do it.”

Santana swallows and grabs for Brittany’s wrist as she starts to stand. “No, no. It’s fine.” Brittany hovers above the chair, half standing and half crouching, caught by the slim fingers clutching desperately at her. “Really,” Santana insists, giving Brittany a small smile and tugging gently on Brittany’s arm to guide her back down between Santana’s knees, “I’ll do it.”

It’s worth swallowing her fear for the beaming smile Brittany gives her, all teeth and sparkling blue and freckles, as she settles herself easily between Santana’s knees. Santana takes a deep breath and pours a generous squirt of lotion into her palm, cringing at the silky-slimy-coolness that soaks into her skin as she rubs her hands together, trying to warm the lotion up and prolong the inevitable before slowly pressing her hands to Brittany’s shoulder blades.

Brittany shivers despite her attempts to warm the sunscreen and hums as Santana starts to spread the white lotion across her shoulders, carefully dipping tan fingers beneath the green bikini strings and down along the subtle line of vertebrae and into the dimples at the small of her back, before running her palms back up and spreading it across already pinked shoulders and up the expanse of neck, carefully avoiding getting too much lotion in the fine, baby strands of blonde hair at the edge of Brittany’s hairline.

Spreading the lotion quickly turns less into rubbing sunscreen into Brittany’s back and shoulders and more tracing the lines of muscle as they twitch under her fingertips and marvelling at the expanse of _softsoftsoft_ skin stretching in front of her. There’s no more lotion between Santana’s palms and Brittany’s skin, and the rest of the word fades away as she runs her fingers across the silky skin, freckled and pink from long days already spend lounging in the morning sun and chasing the munchkin around in the hot afternoons. Santana rests her hands flat against shoulder blades just to feel Brittany’s breath jump under her palms, running one down to trace the gentle slope of her spine and the other up to play with one of the blonde braids dropping over her shoulder and down her back as Brittany tilts her head a little to look back at Santana, her eyes heavy and hooded and darkened blue.

The munchkin and her friends go running by then, screaming and giggling and ignoring Brittany’s shout to slow down around the pool and Santana jerks herself away from Brittany’s back so hard she accidentally yanks on the blonde braid still caught between her fingers and wrenches Brittany’s head back. Brittany lets out a squawk of pain that’s covered by the splashes of the munchkin and her friends cannonballing into the pool. Santana clutches her hands together and wants to apologize, she wants to fall on her knees and beg for forgiveness for pulling Brittany’s hair and for jumping at a bunch of eight-almost-nine year-olds and for being unable to hold her hand in front of anyone and for the entirety of the last year and for breaking both of their hearts over and over and over and over again and for that deep, ever-present, aching shame that claws at the inside of her stomach and demands to be let out and for being so _fucking_ _scared_ all the time.

Instead, Santana stares, wide-eyed, past Brittany’s head, trying to control the play of emotions she can feel bubbling inside and crumpling when she feels Brittany’s warm hand settle on her knee, comforting and patient, and she almost sobs against Brittany’s back when she drops her head down to press her forehead there.

“I don’t know why I’m so scared all the time,” she mumbles, but what she really wants to say is _I’m sorry I can’t do this yet_ and _I want to more than anything else in the entire world_ and _It’s hard in the light of day_ and _My family’s not like yours_ and _I don’t know why I’m still scared around them_ and _That’s a lie I do know_ and _They all believe in keeping secrets a secret_ and _I don’t know if I’d still have a place to sleep if I told them this one_ and _I don’t know if I’d still have a family_ and _I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry_ —

“It’s okay, Santana,” Brittany reassures gently and Santana’s heart breaks and mends itself in those six syllables. 

Santana presses her forehead further into Brittany’s shoulder blade, dropping a quick kiss to the skin right below her lips and crinkling her nose when all she tastes is the chemically acid sweetness of sunscreen instead of Brittany. “I’m sorry,” she finally manages to mumbles.

Brittany starts to turn around but freezes when Santana presses her hands to her spine, holding them both frozen in place, unable to bring herself to look into those too bright, patient blue eyes right now. “For what?” Brittany asks softly, settling back in place.

Santana swallows and presses another quick kiss to Brittany’s shoulder blade, ignoring the grossness of the sunscreen and smiling briefly when she feels a shiver under her palms. “For being like this. For not being able to tell anyone,” Santana sighs deeply burrowing her forehead further against Brittany, to the point that she pushes Brittany forward the slightest bit, “For making you wait.”

Brittany is quiet for a long time, but Santana can feel even breaths under her palms, can feel a steady and sure heartbeat under her forehead. “Oh, Santana,” Brittany finally says, her voice soft and sweet and broken and carrying all her love. Santana feels her stomach twist pleasantly, like the first sip of hot chocolate sliding down her throat and settling warmly inside her after a long day of building snowmen outside with a tinier and more carefree but no less beloved Brittany, back when everything was easier. “You’re getting there,” Brittany assures, her hand starting to trace patterns on Santana’s knee again, sending tingles throughout Santana’s entire body.

Santana sighs and remains relaxed and silent for a moment before turning her head slightly, pressing her temple to Brittany’s shoulder blade and staring at a strawberry-blonde mole sitting a couple centimetres above the green bikini string in front of her face. “I just feel bad,” she admits.

Brittany continues to breathe steadily under Santana’s face, still tracing patterns across Santana’s knee. “About what?”

“That I can’t—” Santana freezes for a second, choking on her words, before pulling back to try and distance herself from Brittany’s too soft and too distracting skin in order to rebuild her thoughts. “That I can’t be who you want me to be right now,” she finally confesses in a trembling voice.

Brittany spins around so fast Santana’s head reels. “Don’t you dare.”

“What?” Santana squawks when Brittany’s hands grab her shoulders, blue eyes flashing fiercely, as Santana’s own hands automatically come up to grab Brittany’s forearms.

“I don’t want you to be anyone other than you,” Brittany whispers, her voice low and intense and fervent.

Santana swallows thickly. “Britt,” she starts to protest, but Brittany cuts her off.

Brittany leans closer, until her peanut-butter-raspberry-jam breath fans across Santana’s cheeks, “I fell in love with _you_ , Santana, not whatever version of you that you think I want. I’m _still_ falling in love with that you, the you that you are when you’re around me. The one that causes me to fall hopelessly and helplessly in love with you every time you smile or hold my hand or look at me. I want to fall asleep next to you so many times that I know you even better than I already do by morning. And I want to forget everything I know about you so that I can relearn it with perfect newness a million times the next day.” Brittany’s hands slide from Santana’s shoulders, up her neck until she’s cupping Santana’s face in her palms. “I want you to be _you_.”

Santana’s breath catches and her fingers tighten around Brittany’s forearms. “I don’t care if you’re not ready to tell everyone yet,” Brittany continues, voice still low and blue eyes still fierce. “I don’t care if you’re not ready to tell anyone until we leave this town or sometime after that. I only care that you are the _you_ that I’m stupidly in love with, and that you learn to accept that I’m so in love with that you that I can’t see straight half the time.” Brittany’s lips quirk up at the unintentional pun, and she stays there grinning at Santana, waiting until her lips tremble around a small smile in return.

“Britt,” Santana murmurs, her voice quivering and her lips trembling. “I— That’s— I mean,” she trails off and tries to swallow the emotion in her throat before looking up into Brittany’s bright eyes, “Thank you,” she finally murmurs, hoping Brittany understands everything she can’t say around the thick lump in her throat, hoping that Brittany understands that her fear won’t hold her in this place of limbo forever because she won’t allow it to, hoping that Brittany understands that what she really means to say is _I love you, I love you, I love you_. Brittany’s eyes gleam and, with a quick glance over her shoulder to the pool on the other side of the yard, making sure that they remain partially hidden in the shadow of the house, she leans in and brushes her chapped lips sweetly against Santana’s once, twice, three times, tasting sweetly of peanut butter and raspberries and sunlight. 

Santana sighs into the butterfly kisses, breathing in Brittany and the comfort of summertime.

Brittany understands what she means, she always does.

 

* * *

 

July comes and goes in the quiet moments, with legs tangled above the too warm comforter and fingers tracing swirling patterns over the spaces between ribs, with a fan curling gusts of too-warm summer air around the room and candy scented breath filling the air and chlorine clinging to sun kissed skin, with thunderstorms unable to cool the sticky air and lips chapped from the summer wind counting new freckles every night, with toothpaste kisses traded in the dusky evening as the sun sets and faces pressed too close to sleep and just close enough to breath properly for the first time in months.

 

* * *

 

Brittany holds her breath and waits in the thunderstorm-darkness of the late night, curled up beside Santana under the covers for the first time all week, the sticky-hotness of a heat wave finally broken by the thunderstorm that’s been brewing on the horizon all day, energy cackling in the air as Lima held its breath and waited for the inevitable.

Brittany’s holding her breath for a different reason. She’s been waiting for a different inevitable. Waiting for the energy cackling in Santana’s body to break, waiting for the snap of energy like she waited to watch the first fat drops of rain hit the sidewalk, pressed against the living room window. Santana spent the day staring so hard into Brittany’s eyes that her soul trembled, falling in the dark depths that were caught on hers, waiting patiently as Santana opened and closed her mouth until she shook her head and glanced away with a strange mix of frustration and anger and sadness.

Brittany knows that Santana’s really been waiting for the darkness before she could convince herself to speak, and so Brittany was waiting for that too. It’s always easier in the dark, to share secrets, because there’s a safety to inky darkness, it always flees in the pink of the inevitable sunrise, taking the night’s shade and secrets with it. 

Sometimes Brittany thinks about that, inevitable things like sunrises and forever and infinity. She understands math, more or less. Or she understands it perfectly when teachers aren’t staring at her with those expectant and critical eyes that make embarrassment crawl, hot and prickling, under her skin and loosens her brain-to-mouth filter because it’s just hard to explain things like forever and limits and infinity when everyone already knows she’s going to give the wrong answer.

She understands things like forever and limits and infinity, more or less, and whenever she’s confused she just has to catch Santana’s eyes and all the muddled confusion and crawling embarrassment falls away and things like forever and infinity make sense because she always knows the exact right answer when Santana is looking up at her with pride.

Thunder rumbles quietly overhead and off to the south. The storm’s moving but the rain continues to pound against the window, even though Santana’s bedroom window is set against the base of the house, partially hidden underneath the porch.

Santana takes a deep breath and Brittany turns her head to press her face to the crown of Santana’s head, counting the spaces between Santana’s breathes and waiting patiently for Santana.

“I—” Santana’s breath rumbles in her chest where it’s pressed to Brittany’s side. Brittany stares up at the ceiling and continues to wait for Santana; she’d wait forever for this moment, but she’s always known, somewhere deep beneath her sternum where her feelings seem to root and bloom up and out, that she wouldn’t have to. “I—” Santana tries again, and then presses her face further into Brittany’s shoulder and takes a deep breath.

“I’m gay.”

Brittany sighs and smiles at the ceiling, tightening her arms around Santana. “I know,” she mumbles.

Santana sighs too and buries herself further into Brittany’s warmth, sliding her fingers under Brittany’s tank and scratching softly against her stomach. “I know you know,” she says, and kisses Brittany’s bare shoulder to prove her point, a tiny smile curving her lips against the bed-warm skin under her mouth. “I just,” she pauses as she nudges her nose along Brittany’s soft skin. The darkness sits heavy and comforting around them, shadows dancing across the room as rain continues to pelt the window. The house is quiet in the early hours of the morning, and the storm outside almost completely masks the sound of Santana’s mother wandering around on the main floor as she gets home from a late shift at the hospital. Brittany runs a hand up Santana’s back back and smooths dark hair away from her face. 

“I’ve never said it out loud,” Santana finally admits, voice small. “I’ve never said ‘I’m gay’ out loud before. Not even to myself.”

Brittany presses a kiss to the top of Santana’s head, breathing in the chemical scent of citrus and vanilla and pinewood. “I’m so proud of you,” she whispers into the dark hair against her lips.

“Yeah?” Santana whispers back, her voice somehow even smaller than before, shrinking like a crocus in the dying light of sunset.

Brittany shifts on the bed, turning slightly so she’s pressed more fully along Santana’s length, limbs tangled and bodies touching at every possible place. “So proud,” she repeats, more sure of this one thing than she’s ever been of anything before. “So, so, so, _so_ proud of how far you’ve come.”

“Even if I have a long way to go?” Santana asks meekly.

Brittany presses the tips of her fingers into the base of Santana’s spine, savouring Santana’s full-body shiver that fingertips on spot always elicit. “Especially then,” she promises.

Santana shifts against Brittany, their legs sliding closer together as Santana tightens her arms around Brittany, drawing her closer into her body and feeling her soul tremble at the warmth and comfort and love that soaks through Brittany’s skin and into her own. Santana lets out a breathy laugh as Brittany’s hands run down her body, trailing over skin and dipping into shadowy creases along her body. Santana hums thoughtfully and tips her head slightly to press her lips to Brittany’s neck, feeling lips brush against her forehead in return. “Why did you want me to come out earlier in the year so badly then?” she finally asks. It’s been something she’s been wondering since that day in the middle of July when Brittany had fiercely promised her that she didn’t care when Santana came out.

Brittany walks her fingers down Santana’s bare arm as she thinks about Santana’s question. Santana is patient and quiet against her, tracing circles on Brittany’s hipbone with her thumb, slowly running her palm up to splay across Brittany’s side and trace patterns in the spaces between her ribs before trailing fingers back down to her hipbone.

“I think,” Brittany starts and then pauses, trying to organize her thoughts so they don’t all jump out at once and confuse Santana. “I think I thought you were ashamed of loving me or something,” she admits.

Santana takes a sharp breath but doesn’t interrupt, giving Brittany long moments to think. “I know now that you weren’t. You were just too scared to say it.” Santana breathes deeply and nods softly against Brittany’s shoulder. “I mean, I didn’t know that then, but I do know. Blindside is twenty out of twenty and all that.”

Santana pauses for a second to think. “Hindsight is 20/20?”

“Yeah, that!”

“I should’ve got that one faster,” Santana chuckles and the sound sends vibrations across Brittany’s neck. She grins up at the ceiling, marvelling, as she does every time, that she’s in love with someone who always understands what she means to say.

“Well, it is like two in the morning or something,” Brittany concedes, pressing her smile into Santana’s hair. She’s quiet for a moment before she continues, “I guess I started to think that you didn’t love me the way I loved you and then _I_ got scared too. I mean, looking back on it I can’t believe I ever thought you weren’t in love with me too, you’re kinda a ginormous sap about it, even if you’re trying to deny it half a second later.”

“Blindside and all that?” Santana teases softly, giggling and smiling into Brittany’s neck.

Brittany giggles too, “Yeah, blindside and all that.” Brittany snuggles further into her pillow, pulling Santana with her and sighing in contentment. “And then I thought you were ashamed of loving me or something, so I started thinking that if you admitted it to everyone you’d, I dunno, prove that you did really love me and weren’t ashamed of it and I wouldn’t have to be so scared that you didn’t actually. Love me, I mean. You know?” Santana takes a moment to process everything and then nods, pursing her lips slightly to brush them against pulse point by her mouth. Brittany sighs and pauses in trailing her fingers up Santana’s back, staring up at the ceiling. “It sounds dumb, I know—”

“No, Britt,” Santana interrupts, her fingers curling around to cup Brittany’s hipbone, her other hand scrunching in the fabric of Brittany’s tank underneath her shoulder, her arm and hand squished between Brittany’s back and the bed, clutching her even closer. “It’s not dumb. I didn’t exactly give you much reassurance on that front.”

Brittany’s quiet for a long moment, stroking her hand along the arm Santana has thrown across her stomach. “Well, we were both kinda dumb last year, weren’t we?”

Santana laughs a little. “Yeah, I suppose we kinda were,” she concedes. They lay there and listen to the other breath in comfortable silence until Santana breaks it, “Is that why you were so mad when I bailed on doing _Fondue for Two_ with you? Because you thought I was ashamed of you?” Santana pauses and swallows thickly, “Of us?”

“I wasn’t mad,” Brittany protests, and then laughs when Santana pinches her side. “Okay, maybe I was a _little_ mad at first, and then I was a little disappointed, but then after the whole thing with you fake-dating Karofsky and then with Kurt at the prom, I finally started to realize exactly what you were so scared of and why you wanted to keep hiding. And that you weren’t ashamed of me or of loving me, just scared of everyone else. And I know you kinda told me that at the lockers but I didn’t really get it at the time, but I do know.”

“You’re so smart, Britt-Britt,” Santana sighs and, even after all this time, Brittany can feel a blush blossom across her cheekbones and her skin feels prickly-hot, but in a warm pleasant way like how homemade soup warms your mouth and stomach when you’re sick, and with the way she feels a smirk curve along her shoulder Santana knows she’s blushing.

“At first I did really want you to come out,” Brittany continues, ignoring her prickly-hot skin and focusing on the blooming warmth in her stomach instead. Santana is quiet for a long moment and Brittany watches shadows dance across Santana’s bedroom walls in the silence before she continues. “I thought that was the answer to all our problems, but then I realized I just wanted you to be yourself even if it wasn’t out in the open.”

“Yeah?” Santana whispers, her voice hopeful and soft and scared all at once.

“Yeah,” Brittany agrees easily, trailing her fingers along Santana’s spine and capturing a shiver against her palms. “I just wanted you to be happy and be the you that you always are around me. I wanted you to embrace all your awesomeness and stop hiding it from me.” Brittany takes a deep breath and lets it out through her nose. “And stop hiding it from yourself.”

Santana breathes against her shoulder, before detangling herself from Brittany just enough to prop herself up on her elbow and gaze down at Brittany. It’s too dark for Brittany to make out her features but she can picture them as easily as if the room was bright with the light of the next morning already; dark brows drawn low and slightly upturned over deep, hopeful, soul-searching eyes, a slight pout to full lips, and face so open it would make Brittany’s chest ache even more than it already is if she could fully see it.

“I’m still not ready to tell anyone else.”

Brittany nods easily. “I know.”

Santana is quiet for a long moment, staring down at Brittany in the darkness of the room. “But I don’t want to hide it from us anymore.”

Brittany smiles up at Santana, trailing her hands up Santana’s sides and around and up to cradle her face. “I know that too.” Brittany can feel Santana’s skin shift and pull as a tiny smile spreads across her face.

“I’m gay,” she says again.

“I know,” Brittany replies, her own smile slowly spreading.

And then Santana’s face is looming even closer and her lips are hovering above Brittany’s own. “I’m gay,” she repeats, her breath fanning across Brittany’s face and filling her nose with the sharp scent of her mint toothpaste, “I’m gay and I like girls.” Brittany’s face stretches into a smile so big a sharp piercing pain shoots at the hinge of her jaw, right below her ears, like when she eats a sour candy and Santana says something that sends Brittany into a laughing fit, dulled both by the absence of sour candy and the presence of pure elation. It’s insistent and a little painful and so, so, so happy. “I’m gay and I like girls, and I’m stupidly in love with _a_ girl,” Santana says, and Brittany can feel Santana’s cheeks stretch under her palms as a smile spreads wide across her face.

Brittany’s never been more certain of herself than she is in this moment, mumbling her words against Santana’s mouth around a wide smile.

“I know.”

 

* * *

 

August is motionless and sticky-hot, broken only by thunderstorms that brew on the horizon in the late afternoon and crack thunder in the evening sunlight; it’s the looming shadow of returning to school hanging as low and heavy as the thunderclouds above them, it’s being caught in summer rain and shrieking with laughter as they race for the cover of the porch, soaked to the bone in seconds and giggling as they pull each other into a well-practiced dance to the music worn into their combined heartbeats.

 

* * *

 

“You were always right,” Santana mumbles, naked and satisfied and nosing against the soft skin of Brittany’s neck.

Brittany runs her hands down Santana’s back, smiling into her dark hair as Santana shudders. “Of course I was,” Brittany says, waiting until she feels Santana’s smile against her skin to press a kiss to the crown of Santana’s head. “About what?”

Santana giggles and curls her fingers over the jut of Brittany’s hip, feeling liquid sunlight settle low in her stomach, before raising herself up on one elbow to gaze down at Brittany’s face. Brittany’s bangs have grown almost all the way out and Santana brushes the golden strands behind her ear and gets distracted by how blue Brittany’s eyes are before she blinks and tries to remember what she was trying to say, ignoring Brittany’s giggle with a fond roll of her eyes. “It is better when we aren’t hiding our feelings,” she admits, suddenly shy and ducking her head, before gathering the courage to meet Brittany’s eyes, and the brightness there is enough to make Santana’s breath catch.

Brittany is beaming, _beaming_ , up at her, eyes sparkling, bright and happy and adoring, nose crinkling adorably as her smile widens. “I love you so much,” Brittany sighs, giving Santana no warning before she surges up to kiss her, which is little more than a press of two beaming smiles, all teeth and tongue and soft, soft lips.

Santana giggles into the kiss, that light and weightless and happy feeling settling more comfortably around her. That feeling her and Brittany had shared all summer had yet to disappear, like the sunshine and candy and toothpaste kisses of dusky evenings had burnt its way into Brittany’s freckled skin and caught in Santana’s sun lightened hair and stayed there long after the pink and orange and red sky was replaced with the inky, starlit night.

She pulls back slightly to pepper short, sweet kisses over Brittany’s chin and jaw and nose, missing her mark more often than not as Brittany shakes with laughter beneath her. “You taste like raspberries,” Santana mumbles into Brittany’s skin somewhere between the jut of her jawline and the lobe of her ear. Brittany laughs harder and tightens her fingers around Santana’s back, trailing one hand through her soft, dark hair, slightly frizzy from air drying after their shower earlier. Santana presses another trail of kisses from Brittany’s ear, across a pink flushed cheekbone, on the two small moles beneath the corners of her right eye, on each of the freckles clustered against the bridge of her nose and on the fading ones on the tip, on the caramel mole at the corner of her mouth, and finally, _finally_ , on Brittany’s soft lips, sucking the vanilla from her lip chap into Santana’s own lips, into her own being. “I love you too,” Santana mumbles against Brittany’s vanilla lips, humming in contentment when Brittany trails her fingers down her back, pressing gently into each vertebrae, and twines their legs closer together. 

Brittany hums against Santana’s lips, fingers tracing patterns in the spaces between Santana’s ribs and smoothing down her sides to tickle sharp hipbones before trailing back up to shoulder blades. Santana sighs into Brittany’s mouth, trailing her lips away to pepper quick kisses along Brittany’s chin and jawline before tracing a path back to soft, vanilla lips. Brittany smiles against Santana’s lips when she starts to sifts around, struggling to adjust herself so she can hold her weight up and touch Brittany’s skin too, eventually giving up with a huffing laugh that vibrates Brittany’s lips, almost like she’s blowing a raspberry, and Brittany’s smile turns into giggles that Santana captures with her own smiling lips. She finally manages to wiggle her arms up so she can slide one hand under Brittany’s shoulder blade, leaning all her weight on that arm so she can reach up to cup Brittany’s cheek.

Brittany starts to giggle when Santana trails her lips back down to trace along her jawline and press butterfly kisses to her neck, when her laugh is interrupted by a yawn. Santana laughs against her neck, stifling her own returning yawn there with a wet kiss. “Tired, Britt-Britt?”

Brittany nods as Santana trails her lips back up to recapture hers, darting a tongue out to trace the full lips pressed against hers and pressing fingertips into the base of Santana’s spine, grinning when she swallows Santana’s gasp of surprise as she shivers.

“We should really go to sleep,” Brittany eventually mumbles against Santana’s lips, fighting from yawning into Santana’s mouth because, while Santana would probably laugh about it, it does seem a little rude.

“Mmm,” Santana agrees, nudging their noses together and pulling Brittany’s bottom lip between her own.

“Santana,” Brittany whines, her voice turning up sharply in a gasp when Santana’s teeth nip at her bottom lip before a tongue darts out to soothe the pain. “We have to get up early for Cheerios camp and I don’t wanna be sleepy.”

“Mmm,” Santana agrees again, but her lips remain pressed to Brittany’s. Though instead of ignoring Brittany’s warnings the kisses turn sweet and quick and chaste before Santana finally pulls back. “You’re right again,” she says with a soft smile.

“Of course I am,” Brittany giggles and pulls Santana down to her, curling them into each other until legs and arms are so hopelessly tangled Brittany couldn’t possibly figure out whose limbs are whose. They settle in the darkness of Brittany’s bedroom, their ribs expanding and contracting together, stomachs and breasts and shoulders pressed together in the steady rhythm of the cyclic breathing filling the air. “Sweet dreams, Santana,” she murmurs.

“Sweet dreams, Britt-Britt. I love you,” Santana mumbles against Brittany’s collarbone, already half-asleep and absolutely adorable.

Brittany feels that same blossoming feeling in her chest she feels whenever she looks at Santana balloon up throughout her limbs as she relaxes further into her best friend and the girl she loves more than she loves anything else in the entire world. She buries her face in dark hair and tightens her arms around the soft warmth burrowing into her body and presses kisses along a sloping hairline, craning her neck and shuffling until she can press her lips once more to the ones that feel like they were made for her own.

“I love you too, San.”

 

* * *

 

August comes and goes in in the quiet moments, with fingers tangled together over the centre console and days spent sprawled over the duvet upside-down and right-side-up and head-to-feet and hips brushing underneath curious hands, with long talks about everything and nothing in the too loud hours between midnight and sunrise, with surprising courage in the shadow of an oak tree under fireworks sparking the night air in flashes of brilliance, with the time it takes to count the spaces between breathes as terror eases into _soon, I’ll be there soon_ and nights spent whispering love that is no longer pushed aside or feared but spoken, aloud, at every possible moment, in words and kisses and morning coffees and afternoon naps and late night texts, with the simplicity of loving your best friend, in the way that it always has been, in hindsight.

 

* * *

 

“Aw c’mon guys, you can’t leave me here alone with these nerds. Plus it’s Lima’s hundred-an-eightieth or some shit. Show some town pride.”

“Fuck off, Puckerman.”

Brittany giggles and bumps Santana’s hip with hers as they walk away. “Be nice, Santana,” she chides, only partially serious.

Santana huffs. “He’s drunk,” she offers.

“Still,” Brittany teases, looping her arm through Santana’s until their elbows lock as they head back to Santana’s car on the other side of the park, hips bumping together with every step.

“Lopez!” Puck calls at their retreating backs, drawing out the vowels until it barely sounds like an actual word.

She uses the hand not caught with Brittany’s to flip him off, not even glancing over her shoulder.

“Aw, Tana,” Brittany says, making a put-upon sigh as she glances over her shoulder, “you made him pout.”

Santana laughs and lifts her other hand to trace Brittany’s knuckles until she’s not twisting back to try and see Puck and most of the other glee club members anymore. “I’m immune to pouting,” Santana says confidently.

A slow smirk spreads across Brittany’s face as she looks down at Santana. “Is that so?” she asks, voice dropping to a honey-smooth husk. Brittany can feel Santana’s shiver and catches a pink tongue darting out to wet full lips. Brittany’s smirk spreads as they skirt some more drunk teenagers. “You wanna bet?”

“Uh, I, uh,” Santana stutters, “no?”

“Why? Scared you’ll lose?”

“What? No, of course not,” she scoffs weakly.

Brittany lets her lips thin and sticks her bottom one out just a little bit, lowering her brows and dipping her head towards her chest before blinking slowly at Santana. “C’mon, Tana, I wanna make a bet.”

Santana shakes her head and resolutely looks anywhere but at Brittany. “Nope, no way.”

“Santana,” Brittany pleads, and Santana’s eyes dart quickly and automatically to Brittany’s at the tone of her voice. 

“Oh c’mon!” Santana complains, throwing her free arm out with mock-exasperation. “Fine, I can resist any pout but _yours_ and that’s why I won’t make a bet I know I’ll lose. Happy?”

Brittany grins widely, tugging Santana the last couple feet to her car with a skip. “Yep!”

Santana rolls her eyes, but the smile dimpling her cheek makes it look adoring rather than annoyed. Santana opens Brittany’s door for her, waiting until all her limbs are tucked in before closing the door, causing a blush to spread across Brittany’s cheeks as she studies her hands in her lap with a goofy smile.

“That was fun!” she says when Santana gets in the car. “The fireworks were so pretty too! And it was really nice hanging out with everyone again.”

Santana smiles as she starts the car, glancing at Brittany glowing in the streetlight a couple feet ahead of the car’s hood. “Yeah, they were really pretty,” she partially agrees before shoulder checking and pulling out onto the mostly deserted street.

Brittany fiddles with the radio, changing the station every time a commercial comes up, until a deep, heavy voice rasps over the speakers and Brittany grins widely, grabbing Santana’s arm in excitement as she cranks the volume up to just a hair below too loud.

“ _Ain’t no doubt about it, we were doubly blessed. ‘Cause we were barely seventeen and we were barely dressed,_ ” Brittany sings loudly, voice skipping an octave higher than Meatloaf’s raspy tenor as she starts dancing in her seat. She turns to Santana with a giggle. “My mom always makes us listen to the classic rock station whenever she drives,” she explains. 

Santana glances over at Brittany with a grin. “I know,” she assures Brittany with a chuckle. “Remember how offended she was when I told her I had never heard _Bohemian Rhapsody_ before?”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so horrified before or since,” Brittany agrees with a carefree laugh, releasing Santana’s arm to take a sip of her milkshake. Santana ignores the empty warmth around her forearm where Brittany’s fingers had been stroking gently to defend herself. 

“It’s not my fault _mi abuela_ only ever listened to boleros and Motown when I was young,” Santana protests, but the grin across her face belies her attempts at defensiveness.

“Still.”

“I was eight!”

“Still,” Brittany repeats, dragging the word out until Santana laughs and swats at Brittany, who leans towards the window and shrieks with laughter as Santana’s fingers dig into her ticklish ribs. The car swerves slightly towards the curb and Santana quickly leans back to straighten the vehicle back out, still giggling at the mock indignation on Brittany’s face. “You’ll pay for that,” Brittany warns, but her voice gets all soft and squishy around the smile that splits her face.

Santana just grins at the road as Brittany makes a put-upon sigh, before just as quickly dancing in her seat again. “ _And now our bodies are oh so close and tight_ ,” Brittany leans towards Santana, her upper body hovering over the middle console as she sings obnoxiously into the imaginary microphone she holds close to Santana’s face, her knuckles brushing against Santana’s cheek. “ _It never felt so good, it never felt so right_.”

Santana is still laughing so hard her stomach twists and her cheeks ache as she tries to keep the car in a relatively straight line. They don’t really have to worry because the road is deserted, with most of the town still hanging around Main Street or the parks for the parade after the fireworks, and neither of them even touched the alcohol Puck had brought because they promised to babysit Brittany’s little sister tonight for the Pierce’s bimonthly date night, but she’d really hate to give any cops that impression that she’s drunk because it would completely ruin how happy and carefree and light she feels right now, with Brittany singing obnoxiously into her ear between giggles.

“ _And we’re glowing like the metal on the edge of a knife_ ,” Brittany sings and Santana giggles and pushes Brittany’s face away from hers, “ _We’re glowing like the metal on the edge of a knife._ ” And then Brittany’s voice changes, jumping up in volume and pitch as she taps out the drum beat against her thighs, her feet bouncing against the floor mat as she wiggles in her seat, her arms raised above her head and her shoulders shimmying, “ _C’mon! Hold tight. Oh, c’mon. Hold tight_!” her voice jumps up again on the last line and cracks the single syllable into two in what is a hilariously accurate mocking of most of the glee boy’s falsettos. 

Santana laughs, too loud and too wild and happier than she’s ever been; though she’s sure that will change tomorrow because every time she’s with Brittany she feels, impossibly, happier than the time before. The music breaks into a short instrumental and she takes the time between streetlights to glance over at Brittany, still dancing in her seat. Her twin braids are coming undone at the back from laying on the blanket to watch the fireworks, a red lipstick kiss stands stark against her pale freckled skin from where Santana had blushingly pressed her lips to the cheekbone a couple hours earlier when the urge had become too strong to ignore, her eyes flashing faintly in the greenish-blue light from the radio screen and lit up buttons on the car’s dash when she glances over at Santana with a smile. Santana’s breath catches somewhere in her chest and she glances back at the road, trying to ignore how distractingly pretty Brittany is and the pleasant twist in her stomach when she thinks of that soft, awed smile Brittany gave her after she kissed her cheek under fireworks painted against a starry sky, and of the pride that glinted in bright blue eyes when she realized Santana had barely glanced around to see if anyone was watching them. Residual fear churns in Santana’s stomach, but listening to Brittany breathe beside her settles her nerves and, even that simple act of Brittany just _being_ beside her, brings a comfortable sense of calm to her body.

“ _Though it’s cold and lonely in the deep dark night,_ ” Brittany sings, her voice softer with the weight of her gaze upon Santana’s face. A smile twitches at the corners of Santana’s lips as the streetlights paint the road in flashes of gold ahead of them, and it feels like they’re the only two people in the world.

“ _I can see paradise by the dashboard light,_ ” Santana quietly continues when she hears Brittany’s breath catch and fade on the last note. She glances over at the passenger seat again, catching eyes that are impossibly soft. The streetlight they drive under paints Brittany’s face in a brief flash of warmth, her features drawn together in that same soft and awed look from earlier in the night when she felt Santana’s lips brush against her skin. Santana looks back to the road and swallows past the sudden tightness in her throat, before dropping her right hand from the steering wheel to the console, palm up, and glancing over at Brittany with a warm smile, her left cheek dimpling in the golden glow of a streetlight. Brittany’s face, impossibly, seems to soften even more at the offered hand, and she makes a small noise of contentment in the back of her throat.

“ _Though it’s cold and lonely in the deep dark night,_ ” they sing together, their voices harmonizing higher than Meatloaf’s rasp, slightly out of key and perfect, “ _In the deep dark night._ ” Brittany’s fingers slide easily between Santana’s and tighten, her thumb rubbing across the fleshy juncture where Santana’s thumb turns into her first finger.

Santana glances at Brittany again, her features painted again in the greenish-blue of the lights on the car’s dash, and their eyes catch and hold, smiles relaxed and soft and crinkling sparkling eyes, fingers intertwined and palms fitting together as easily as they have since they were both tiny five years old with toothy grins and gleaming eyes.

“ _Paradise by the dashboard light_.”

 

* * *

 

Summer comes and goes in the quiet moments, with the sweet scent fresh-cut grass filling the neighbourhood and the chlorine-salt of pool water rushing up noses and burning like the first breath of winter air, with the courage that comes from summer nights and late mornings and long hours of moonlit bedrooms, with sleepy moments of loving kisses and giggles and _I love you’s_ breathed against the shells of ears and pressed softly into palms and knuckles and bellybuttons, with courage filled kisses and gentle hands cupping cheeks in _I know, thank you, I love you too_.

It’s at the end of the summer that Santana offers Brittany her hand without fear.

 

* * *

 

_“I want to tell you a secret and I want you to listen with your lips_

_I want my hands on your hips like they were their final resting place_

_And then put that funeral onto paper so you can trace their lifetime back to the fact_

_That I’m more inclined to find a place in your heart to haunt for as long as you want me to._

_Lady, I’ll rattle chains up and down the halls of you.”_

 

* * *

 

Summer is a new beginning unfurling underneath sternums and blossoming up into blushing smiles.

It’s kisses that taste of chlorine and strawberries and carefree youth, where they can just be the them that they never are at school as summer opens itself to a brand new start.

 

* * *

 

It’s the end of summer that Santana offers Brittany her hand without fear.

 

* * *

 

August comes and goes in the quiet moments.

It’s motionless and sticky-hot, broken only by rain-soaked rain sticking to cheeks as bodies move to the beat of their hearts.

 

* * *

 

July comes and goes in the quiet moments.

It’s lazy days, sprawling on beds and in backyard grass and under the shade of an old oak tree where kid-stupid courage pressed lips together for the very first time.

 

* * *

 

June comes and goes in the quiet moments.

It’s weekend sleepovers, the return of linked pinkies in the hallways and glee club practice and in the second row of history class and giggling against shaking shoulders.

 

* * *

 

Summer comes and goes in the quiet moments.

It’s fresh-cut grass and chlorine-salt water, sleepy courage and soft _I love you’s_ and _I love you too’s_ around the radio’s quiet singing _“I can see paradise by the dashboard light.”_

 

* * *

 

It’s at the start of summer that Brittany offers her hand to Santana without fear.

 

* * *

 

_“I want you to want me to be the me that you see when I’m free to be the me that got you next to me_

_And as for romance, well, I want that too_

_I want to fall asleep next to you one hundred times a night so that I can know you one hundred times better before we hit the day light_

_And in spite of all of this, I also want amnesia_

_So that I can relive each kiss with a perfect newness that leaves me smashed in the arms of rapture_

_I want the sky to fracture under the impossible weight of an apology_

_‘Cause I’m sorry, I’m sorry that I want so much_

_I’m sorry that I’ve been using ‘I’m sorry’ as a crutch to lean on for so long_

_But if you sing me that song of sweet logic again_

_Then I promise to make the effort to stand on my own.”_

 

* * *

 

_“Why don’t you wear your glasses?”_

_Santana jumps and bangs her knees on the bottom of her desk, muttering under her breath before glaring up at the speaker. Her glare fades when she looks up into blue eyes so bright she feels her stomach twist, like that moment right before her papi catches her after tossing her into the sunlight, like that brief moment where she’s suspended against the sky with nothing but endless possibilities around her while she flies against the summer sky._

_“Huh?” she manages to ask._

_The girl grins down at her brightly, but then her eyebrows draw together in confusion, or at least Santana thinks they do, it’s hard to see them under her blonde bangs. “I asked why you don’t wear your glasses?”_

_Santana swallows nervously and shifts in her seat, carefully not looking into her desk where she knows the black frames rest. “I don’t have glasses,” she lies easily, but only because she’s staring at a freckled nose and not into blue eyes._

_The girl frowns a little, her mouth pulling into a thin line and turning slightly down at the corners. “Sure you do. You always wear them on the bus here and home.”_

_Santana’s eyes dart up to blue again and she breathes in sharply through her nose. The girl still looks confused, still pouting a little, and Santana deflates, slouching in her seat. “They make me look dumb,” she mumbles._

_The girl tips her head to the side, thoughtful and confused and earnest, “I think they make you look really smart and pretty.”_

_Santana’s face feels like when she sits too close to the campfire at her cousin’s house outside of town and she furiously scrubs at her heated cheeks, trying to rub the burning away. “Yeah well,” she finally says._

_The girl still looks confused and a little bit sad but then she brightens and smiles around it, her eyes shining a little bit and crinkling at the corners. “I’m Brittany,” she offers._

_Santana looks up at the girl and manages a small smile, which causes Brittany’s smile to widen and her eyes to scrunch mostly closed so they look almost like diamonds. “I’m Santana.”_

_The teacher comes in and tells everyone to take their seats, and Santana expects Brittany to go back to sitting at the front in the seat she claimed on the first day of kindergarten three days ago. Instead, Brittany walks around the desks and flops into the empty one beside Santana, all the way at the back of the classroom where the words on the board are far away and more than a little fuzzy without her glasses._

_“What are you doing?” Santana hisses._

_Brittany smiles brightly at her. “If you aren’t going to wear your glasses then you can’t read the board and then you’ll get in trouble with the teacher again for not paying attention even though you are but you just can’t answer right because you can’t see.”_

_Santana nods uncertainly. “Yeah, but,” she starts and then doesn’t know what else to say._

_“So,” Brittany continues, dragging the word out until it doesn’t even sound like a word anymore and Santana giggles a little. Brittany smiles, proud of herself and bouncing slightly in her seat, and leans closer to Santana, whispering like they’re sharing a secret, “I’ll sit beside you.”_

_“Why?” Santana can’t help but ask, equally as quietly._

_“So I can whisper what the words say to you without the teacher noticing, silly,” Brittany says easily._

_Santana’s jaw slackens as she stares at Brittany grinning beside her before she snaps her mouth closed with a quiet click of teeth. “Thank you,” Santana finally murmurs while the teacher starts talking at the front of the classroom._

_“What are friends for?” Brittany whispers back with a wide, toothy grin, her eyes turning into diamonds again._

_Santana swallows thickly and smiles shyly back at Brittany. “Friends,” she repeats softly._

_Brittany doesn’t answer, just smiles gently at her before murmuring the words the teacher writes on the whiteboard into Santana’s ear._

_Santana is able to follow along with the lesson for the first time in three days, and even when the teacher scolds her and Brittany for giggling halfway through the lesson the smile doesn’t fall from Santana’s face until the bell rings for recess. When Brittany stands, Santana is sure she’s is going to leave to go play with her other friends, but then she turns back to Santana and tips her head, staring down at her as her blonde hair swings forward to cover her shoulder._

_“It’s recess,” Brittany says quietly, her face twisted in confusion again._

_“Yeah,” Santana agrees, “I thought you were going to play with your friends.”_

_“How would I play with my friends if you stay at your desk for recess?”_

_“Yeah but—” Santana stops and swallows her words before smiles hesitantly up at Brittany. “What do you wanna play?”_

_“We could play house,” Brittany squeals, bouncing up on her toes and beaming down at Santana._

_Santana frowns and thinks of her own family. “We don’t have a papi,” she finally says uncertainly._

_Brittany frowns for a brief second and something deep in Santana’s stomach twists at the pout on Brittany’s face. She’s about to take it back when Brittany’s whole face lights up again. “One of us could be a papi!” she says, bouncing._

_Santana has to tip her head back to see all of Brittany’s face. “But we’re not boys,” Santana says carefully._

_Brittany’s grin doesn’t fade and Santana feels her face get too hot, like her skin can’t contain herself. “Then we can both be mommys,” she says easily. Santana looks down at her feet and scuffs one shoe against the tiled floor, rubbing a faded black mark along the tiles with an arc of her foot. “C’mon,” Brittany prompts, offering her hand to Santana. Santana stares at it for a long moment, and then around the classroom as if she’s afraid of getting in trouble with their teacher ushering students out the door or with their classmates as they pull on jackets and outdoor shoes, and then up at Brittany’s freckled, beaming face, her blue eyes still sparkling brightly._

_“Okay,” Santana says simply, and she takes Brittany’s hand._

 

* * *

 

It’s on the first Thursday of September that Brittany offers Santana her hand for the very first time.

It’s on the first Thursday of September that Santana takes Brittany’s hand for the very first time.

 

* * *

 

It’s at the start of the summer that Brittany offers Santana her hand without fear.

It’s at the end of the summer that Santana offers Brittany her hand without fear.

 


End file.
